Quote: Original post by LessBread
Baucus is pushing the Republican alternative from 1994. Individual mandates without the public option amounts to a massive government subsidy to the health care insurance industry. The excuse he gave about why he voted against Rockefeller's amendment, that there weren't enough votes in the full Senate to break a filibuster, is completely spurious. The insurance company lobbyists got their money's worth when they bribed him.

Agreed, though the exemptions do alleviate one concern about financial burdens that might have been put on some in the middle-class.

Personally, I'd be surprised if people aren't given the choice to join a publicly-run plan in the final legislation, since every single one of the other (5?) proposals includes it, if I recall correctly. I think the real action is going to come when the House and Senate reconcile their bills.

Quote: Original post by HostileExpanse

Quote: Original post by LessBread
Baucus is pushing the Republican alternative from 1994. Individual mandates without the public option amounts to a massive government subsidy to the health care insurance industry. The excuse he gave about why he voted against Rockefeller's amendment, that there weren't enough votes in the full Senate to break a filibuster, is completely spurious. The insurance company lobbyists got their money's worth when they bribed him.

Agreed, though the exemptions do alleviate one concern about financial burdens that might have been put on some in the middle-class.

If Congress and Obama were truly concerned about financial burdens on the middle class, they would have pushed single payer from the start. They are more concerned with milking health insurance lobbyists than they are with preventing the health insurance industry from driving the middle class into bankruptcy.

Quote: Original post by HostileExpanse
Personally, I'd be surprised if people aren't given the choice to join a publicly-run plan in the final legislation, since every single one of the other (5?) proposals includes it, if I recall correctly. I think the real action is going to come when the House and Senate reconcile their bills.

Agreed. And if the final bill lacks public choice, it's doomed, and the Dems along with it.

Just a note from Australia, guys:

Quote: One thing about all the local media reports I've seen/heard on the issue is that the journalists all seem to approach their reports with a sense of bemusement that this is such a difficult thing for America to do. It's kind of this "If we have it, how come it's so hard for them to have it?" attitude that comes out in a lot of reporting here.

grabbed from here, for what it's worth.

Quoted for eloquence, mainly. The US should've had universal health care long ago, vital basic humanitarian infrastructure such as health care should be above silly capitalist games and accusations of socialism, communism et al.

Quote: Original post by LessBread
Baucus is pushing the Republican alternative from 1994. Individual mandates without the public option amounts to a massive government subsidy to the health care insurance industry. The excuse he gave about why he voted against Rockefeller's amendment, that there weren't enough votes in the full Senate to break a filibuster, is completely spurious. The insurance company lobbyists got their money's worth when they bribed him.

[stuff about flood insurance]

I just wanted to mention that the reason why there is public flood insurance available in flood-prone places is because private insurance companies usually refuse to offer flood insurance (at least at rates that are at all reasonable), because they don't see it as a financially sound coverage to provide. Often when a home is flooded it's a total loss for the affected area, which is incredibly expensive to the insurer.

Similar insurances exist for earthquake and windstorm (hurricane) events in applicable areas, and I believe that there are some states where publicly funded property/home insurances do exist (it's been awhile since I've talked to the property actuaries and underwriters at my workplace), but in large I don't believe that those options exist across the country, and where they do exist they are fairly limited in the scope of what they cover.

I think it's a bit of an exaggeration to make the claim that we've put property above people and then cite flood insurance as an example of public insurance as though all of our homes are insured without having to go to a private insurer. The scope of it is much more restricted than that.

Whether there SHOULD be public home/property insurance or not is a separate question and one I'm not going to weigh in on. I just wanted to make sure everyone understood a few things about the flood insurance in that clipping you quoted.

Quote: Original post by Dragon88
I just wanted to mention that the reason why there is public flood insurance available in flood-prone places is because private insurance companies usually refuse to offer flood insurance (at least at rates that are at all reasonable), because they don't see it as a financially sound coverage to provide.

I think this is precisely the point that LessBread has been trying to make about health insurance.

No health insurance company wants to insure people they have to pay out money to. When they do insure those people it is often at tremendously high rates based on 'pre-existing conditions'. A health insurance company's goal is to insure as many healthy people as possible at the highest rates possible. The libertarian argument that people would tend to choose health insurance that is better and cheaper fails for the same reason you say there aren't good and affordable options for private flood insurance for people that are likely to need it the most.